


Assuming, Arguendo

by dreamlittleyo



Series: Facts [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, First Time, M/M, Sibling Incest, Wincest - Freeform, Wordcount: 1.000-5.000, Wordcount: Over 1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-06
Updated: 2011-04-06
Packaged: 2017-10-17 16:07:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/178571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dreamlittleyo/pseuds/dreamlittleyo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's still got a destiny, Dean is still stubborn as hell, and they both have some shit to figure out.  Vague spoilers through "Red Sky at Morning".<br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	Assuming, Arguendo

After Sam says no, he knows that's not the end of it. It _should_ be. His one miraculous moment of willpower, and he wishes it were enough.

Things aren't the same between them after Dean kisses him. The surface is still unbroken familiarity, all easy banter interrupted by the same useless fights as before. Nothing has changed that needs to. Dean is still pushing. Is still the same hypocritical jack-ass telling Sam to leave well enough alone when he couldn't do it himself.

But everything _else_ has changed, and in the quiet moments Sam can see just how much. Driving through twilight, the sunset gone dusty red on the horizon, and Sam feels something different in Dean's worried glances. Something impossible to decipher and a little bit off, and Sam keeps staring out the window every time it happens.

This isn't living, isn't even fighting anymore. It's stasis. A precarious balance against a wall gone tissue-paper thin, and any second something is going to come apart.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It follows a case gone every possible kind of wrong. A slew of sacrifices leading to a massive slaughter, and they don't get there fast enough to do anything but clean up the mess.

Dean knows, and Sam can see it bleeding off him, the anger and failure that come with solving the mystery too late. But Dean wasn't _there_. Didn't see it with his own eyes, wasn't the one to call in an anonymous tip and stand waiting in the shadows until the EMT's arrived and found nothing left to do but round up the bodies.

The world doesn't fit right through the frustration tearing at Sam's soul, and Dean keeps throwing him these looks from the driver's seat, the highway dark and grim along their retreat. His brother's worry chafes like a steam burn along Sam's skin, and he barely grunts at Dean's half-hearted attempts at conversation. He doesn't want to talk right now, doesn't dare look at Dean, and tries to blank his mind against all the ways they could have gotten there faster.

It's stupid and naïve, but Sam still thinks maybe if he saves enough people his destiny can't have him. Like the taint of demon's blood can't touch him if he saves the world somehow, and maybe it can counterbalance the other shit he knows he's got to do. There's a line to be walked here, if he can just stay on it, tightrope thin and rising.

But the hope leaves every failure burning at him all the worse, an angry stab that feels like fate. Dean is behind the wheel, is too close and too far off, and Sam wishes any of it made sense.

The car slows, and he tenses up at the familiar sound of gravel crunching beneath the tires. When Dean kills the engine, the silence of night rings suddenly cacophonous in Sam's ears.

He doesn't mean to do it. It's not a conscious choice, not a good idea, not _anything_ , and he already knows it's not going to end well. But when Dean opens his mouth to speak, probably to say something numb and helpless like, "Can't save everyone," something in Sam snaps taut and splits in two.

He's on his brother in an instant, shoving him against the driver's door and capturing his mouth in a kiss immediately hard and desperate. Dean makes a startled sound against his lips, one hand finding the seatback for balance. The other fists in Sam's coat as Sam maneuvers with a forceful coordination that gets Dean sprawled across the seat and Sam pressed close between his legs.

Dean's mouth is reluctant beneath him, surprised and still and stubbornly closed until Sam grasps at his brother's jaw and coaxes him open. It's harsh and wrong between them, and all Sam can think about is Dean kissing him before, a deliberate suggestion in a worthless hotel room, and he doesn't know if the offer still stands. Even if it does, he knows he can't do this, can't take Dean up on it. But everything hurts, edged in frustration, impotent rage and fear, and Sam wants too much.

A desperate rhythm slides between them, overtakes Sam at least. His hands clutch at Dean's hips and he grinds down hard through denim, even as his tongue fucks deep into Dean's mouth to absorb the conflicting tastes of coffee, terror and spit. When Dean drags free to breathe, Sam barely gives him an instant to suck in fresh air before diving back in. The moment is thick and wrong and perfect, and Sam is so close to coming he can taste it in the back of his throat.

He groans aloud when Dean suddenly works his hands between their chests and shoves, tearing away from the kiss and growling a ragged, "Sam, _no_."

It's almost not enough. Sam can feel it, like a voice in the back of his head, soft and insidious, and he grabs Dean by the wrists and rocks against him again. Their eyes lock hard, Dean's widening in something that Sam recognizes as fear, and it sends him jerking back to huddle against the passenger door, hard-on still throbbing stubbornly against the zipper of his jeans. He buries his head in his hands, lets out a jagged choke of breath, and refuses to meet Dean's gaze through the dark confines of the car.

"I thought…" Dean's voice cracks, and Sam braces through the moment it takes him to try again. "You said you didn't _want_ that, dude."

And Sam whimper-sobs into his hands, because he's got no idea how to explain that, yeah, he kind of does. More than 'kind of', the sharp spike of want solidifying in his chest to something more like need, and he finally straightens up and stares out the window. A mask of forcible calm drops easily across his features, and he hears Dean inhale sharply beside him.

"I'm sorry," Sam finally says, eyes still locked straight ahead even though there's nothing to see in the darkness beyond the windshield. "I know you don't want… I know this isn't okay. And I'm sorry."

"I don't want an _apology_ , Sam," says Dean. His tone is exasperated, but Sam can hear the brittle edge of something else and knows his brother is barely keeping it together.

"Dean--"

"I'm serious. I don't care if you're sorry, I just want to know what all this _is_. What's going on in your freaky head lately?"

"I'm slipping, man. I can feel it." He doesn't mean to say it or admit that much to the suddenly tense air between them, and he snaps his mouth shut. Dean prods at him, pushes for explanation, but he refuses to say anything more.

When Dean restarts the car, Sam can see his hands are shaking. He can't stop staring at them, can't quite care that his scrutiny makes Dean uncomfortable. As the interstate roars beneath them, Sam curls against the door and closes his eyes. His erection is stubborn and slow to fade, and he falls asleep to the memory of Dean trembling in his hands.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Dean is good at shoving things to the back of his brain and resolutely failing to think about them, but even the greatest masters of denial have their limits. Sam is distant as they deal with a ghost ship and the hand of a hanged man, and Dean can't shut down the spinning knot of tension that settles between them. He can't breathe through it, can't get his head around it, can't figure out how much is Sam and how much is his own mass of confused intent. He wouldn't have offered in the first place if he couldn't follow through, and he's not sure where that puts him now.

Worse, what little perspective he has is dripping away, drop by vital drop. He doesn't know anymore where Sam stops and he starts, can't tell whose need he's even _feeling_ when they're joined at the hip like this. Crippled without each other, breaking themselves into jagged edges simply by being together, and Dean feels nauseous at the slowly percolating revelation that maybe he's not so opposed to what Sam wants as he should be.

All of a month later, they chase down a minotaur in an honest-to-god hedge maze, walls of bush grown tall and carefully trimmed. It isn't a public park, so getting inside requires maneuvering past a couple nearly competent guards. But they have the place to themselves once they're in, sculpted shrubs, winding paths and all, and it's perversely pleasant for once not worrying to keep their voices down.

They waste the thing with cold iron, a whole _lot_ of cold iron, and leave its enormous corpse in the center of the maze. Let the groundskeeper discover the damn thing. They can't burn it without setting the whole maze alight, which makes it someone else's problem.

Dean is all turned around from the trip _in_ , so on the way out he sticks close to Sam. The freak must have memorized the route beforehand, which in retrospect was probably a smart way to go. Dean doesn't spare it much thought, makes note for next time. At the moment he's a little busy keeping up with his brother. Sam picks up speed as he moves, heels disappearing around corners almost before Dean sees what direction they're going, and he bites his tongue to keep from ordering Sam to slow down.

He keeps apace by force of will, not sure what they're playing at, and upon emerging they both immediately collapse side-by-side on a wrought iron bench. Dean is breathing hard, but he's gratified to see that so is Sam. He isn't quite quick enough to swallow it down when his rebellious mouth asks, "What the hell, dude? We training for a marathon now?"

He doesn't actually care. Doesn't particularly want or need an answer, but his breath still catches sharp in his throat when Sam levels an uncommunicative look at him. They hover in that moment, something in Dean's chest fracturing under the weight, and he's moving well before his upstairs brain has approved the plan.

He shifts across the bench and straddles Sam, feels the cold digging press of sculpted iron against his knees.

"Dean?" Sam asks, and it's all he gets to say before Dean kisses him, before Sam is kissing Dean back, before the slip of air and fabric between them is super-heated with a whole lot of things that shouldn't be there.

It's not so urgent as Sam's desperate attack in the car a month ago, but Dean doesn't even know what he's offering this time. Doesn't know what he's doing or why he's doing it, but _god_ Sam tastes good. He feels the vibration of Sam's groan against his tongue, feels the hardening press of Sam's dick hot between his thighs. Wrong-wrong- _wrong_ , and Dean just opens wider for Sam's explorations, rubs closer when Sam grasps at him with fingers that squeeze too tight.

It doesn't end the way Dean expects. Not that he thought any of this through, not that he's got any clear expectations about what happens now. But a fuzzy idea, he's got _that_ , and it's not Sam pulling suddenly away, heaving him off and to the ground. Dean's tailbone throbs where it collides with pavement, and he stares up at his brother with wide eyes that he _knows_ say too damn much.

"God _damnit_ , Dean," Sam hisses, a horrible, strangled sound too far back in his throat.

Dean can only watch as his brother retreats into the surrounding darkness. When he stands and dusts himself off, it's with numb confusion settling across the ragged edges of questions he isn't ready for. Probably never will be, because questions about whether maybe you want your baby brother to fuck you, those are sometimes too much for even a Winchester to handle.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It doesn't fade out to manageable distraction in the days that follow, for either one of them so far as Dean can tell, and he watches with growing desperation in his blood as Sam spirals further and further away.

No matter how close he watches, Sam still manages to slip out and disappear on him for hours at a time. Sometimes he just comes back looking tired. Sometimes he comes back with eyes on fire and a bullet missing from the colt. He always comes back just a little bit different, or maybe Dean is hallucinating that part. But every time, it chips a little more of Dean's armor loose. And every time, the small pocket of helplessness in his gut spreads a little bit wider.

When a nest of pixies nearly kicks their asses it's downright embarrassing, but eventually they walk away victorious. Rather, Dean walks away, and Sam mostly stumbles. He sparkles a little, from the dose of that sketchy-looking fairy dust he's got all over his skin, and on the drive back into town Dean can't tell if his brother is high or drunk. Both, maybe, or somewhere in-between. Screwed to shit, whichever it is, and Dean has to manhandle him through the door because Sam won't stop staring at the stars long enough to come inside. At least he's steady on his feet again. It's something.

"You're stupid _and_ a jack-ass," Dean informs him darkly, locking the deadbolt and sliding the chain into place. Sam doesn't quip back like he should. He doesn't respond at all, in fact, and a shiver runs down Dean's spine when he turns and meets his brother's eyes.

"Dean," Sam says, voice low and easy as he edges close. He doesn't allow Dean time to speak before shoving him hard against the window. Sam's mouth seals sudden over his, and Dean's cheeks burn with shame. Not at the compromised position when they've been in so much worse, but at the desperate whimper the contact elicits from him.

He fails at regaining either focus or words, but he finally manages to break free of the kiss. The kiss, but not Sam's hold, and as Dean gasps fresh air into starved lungs, Sam's lips and teeth fasten hard just beneath his jaw.

Sam's hands are harsh and sure, all pushy insistence, and Dean knows in a flash that he'll have to hurt Sam to stop this. A prospect that would leave him conflicted enough standing solo, but the darkness is closing in around them, tight and precarious. Dean's lungs are constricted with it, with the spasming uncertainty of watching his brother pull back and hide away night after night. He doesn't know how to fight anymore. Doesn't know how to do much of anything besides hold on as hard as he can.

Maybe he wants this. Maybe he just doesn't know what else to _do_. He knows Sam is lying to him all the goddamn time lately, and maybe he's just tired of it. Because Sam's mouth, Sam's hands, Sam's desperate attempt at laying claim, it feels like more honesty than they've had between them for weeks, and maybe Dean couldn't resist it if he wanted to.

So he doesn't try.

When Sam presses insistent fingers to the seam of his lips, Dean sucks them in and licks between. When Sam's other hand glides sure around his cock, Dean whines and twists harder into the touch. When Sam pries him open and prepares him, Dean barely chokes back a whimper, muffled by the possessive slide of Sam's lips across his own. And when Sam drives his dick home, buries himself in Dean's body, Dean arches against the intrusion and cries out.

He lets Sam take everything. Lets Sam pin him to the bed and fuck him raw. It hurts like hell, and he doesn't care. Pain is nothing next to whatever this is, burning dark between them and jacked to hell. It's nothing next to the persistent gnaw of fear, knowing Sam isn't himself right now and Dean has no business giving in.

But Sam hasn't been himself in weeks, and Dean feels the burning thrusts of his brother's dick like a sick sense of relief settling straight into his bones. Sam's teeth dig harsh and perfect into his throat, his shoulder, his jaw, and Sam's hands press bruises deep into Dean's skin.

He's got no goddamn business offering this, taking this, letting Sam come buried inside him with Dean's name a muffled shout on his lips. He's got no right, but it doesn't make a splinter of difference when the world is strangling shattered around him.

Sam holds onto him after they disentangle, not letting Dean up from the bed, and Dean burrows close into his brother's possessive embrace for however long he has.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Sam wakes slowly the next morning, feeling numb and fuzzy, nothing like any hangover he's ever experienced. The first thing he notices, before he opens his eyes, is the warm bulk he holds tucked up close to his chest. Solid and breathing and Dean-shaped, short spikes of hair tickling the underside of Sam's chin, and it's enough to drag him to full, adrenaline-pumping consciousness in the span of a heartbeat.

"Dean?" he says, opening his eyes but holding otherwise still. The soft inquiry earns him no response, so he tries again. Louder. Reluctant to release his grip until he has to, even as he chokes on quiet terror.

His third attempt makes the warm figure stir against him, and the next instant he feels Dean go suddenly, inevitably rigid in his arms.

"Shit," Dean mutters, pulling sluggishly away. Sam lets him go, still reluctant, and tries not to drown in the rapid, deafening beat of his own pulse.

"Dean, did we…"

"What do you _think_ , Einstein?" Sam can tell the heat in the words isn't anger. It's shame, and he feels sick with it himself. He knows better than to apologize. Not like this, not with Dean giving him that _look_. Instead they pretend, badly, that this is a typical morning, fighting over who gets first shower and who has to go turn in the room keys for checkout.

They don't really talk the rest of the day, barely make eye contact unless they really goddamn have to. But Sam _stares_ every second his brother pretends to stop paying attention. Dean is in rough shape, and even from a safe few feet away Sam can see it, the echoing traces of last night. Fucked almost bloody and covered in bruises from Sam's desperate hold. He can see the bruises peeking out beneath cuffs and sleeves, bites and hickeys and claim he remembers laying all across his brother's body.

Sam feels white-hot nausea stab at his gut to see Dean's unsuccessful attempts at hiding his discomfort. He can't quite camouflage the deliberate care of every movement, and Sam is helpless with the knowledge that Dean doesn't _want_ this. Sam _knows_ , because Dean all but said so, and he _can't_ , and how can Sam save his brother from hell when _this_ is all he can think about?

So he bottles it up, knows Dean is doing the same, and they struggle their way through a new day and a new hunt that's nowhere near distracting enough.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

A week after Dean's bruises fade, Sam still doesn't particularly want to talk about it. There's a quiet, growling voice in his head pointing out that sometimes things get broken so badly there's no fixing them. He can't read Dean for shit lately, won't know if there's any fixing things between them until he _tries_ , so naturally he's terrified to make an attempt.

None of it goes away. Just festers in his chest, an aching throb of something tense and fractured that refuses to ease down, and on their way out to the car in the dead of a Kentucky night, Sam finally hits the wall.

"Why?" he asks, face as bland as he can make it.

Dean doesn't pretend not to understand. Doesn't _answer_ either, and when he moves to flee the conversation entirely, Sam has to grab and restrain him to prevent his retreat. It's only natural, really, that he ends up pinning Dean against the side of the Impala. Or maybe it's completely _un_ natural, but he does it anyway. Stares Dean down until his brother's stubborn façade crumbles away to nothing.

"I'm losing you, Sammy" Dean whispers.

"What?" Sam is confused, still crowding into Dean's space, and there's no backing off now.

"You think I don't see it, but I do. And I don't know what to _do_ , man."

Sam isn't quite willing to wrap his head around the words, honest and ridiculous and _this_ is what Dean is messed up about? He was sure it had more to do with Sam getting high off goddamn _fairy dust_ and screwing him senseless.

"Just let me _save_ you," says Sam, and how could he be any clearer than all the fights they've had since Dean made his deal?

"No," Dean's protest is automatic. "Sam, _no_. You'll die."

"We don't know that. But we _do_ know you're going to hell if I do nothing." He shakes with rage, with terror, with everything in-between as he quietly demands, "How can you ask me to live with that?"

Dean refuses to meet his eyes following the question. Sam watches his brother's gaze unfocus along the horizon, deliberate distance that he feels like a physical barrier between them, and he shakes Dean _hard_ to drag him back from wherever he's gone.

"What do you want, Dean?" he asks, voice sliding desperate. "I'm not going to stop looking for a way out of this, so you gotta tell me what else you want."

"Christ, Sam, I don't know. I don't want to see you lose it, okay? I want you to stop running around behind my back!"

"You can't protect me from everything." He knows Dean won't accept it, and he says it anyway. "There are things I have to do now that…" He trails off and swallows hard and still manages to sound confident when he says, "You can't protect me forever."

"I can goddamn try."

The words are exactly Dean, stubborn in the face of futility, and Sam stares him down for a full, gauging minute. In the end, he's not sure why he says it. Maybe there isn't reason behind it at all, just a moment of truth, of trying to scare Dean off the last way he can.

"I'm some kind of antichrist," he says. Watches as Dean's face sharpens into surprised disbelief, maybe a buried layer of uncertainty. "There are demons calling me the _boy king_. Tell me that doesn't freak you out."

Dean takes a moment to absorb that before he snarls, "Of course it freaks me out!" But his tone is more angry than scared, hinting at an inevitable ass-kicking for being kept in the dark. "But I don't buy it, Sam. You're still _you_. You're still holding on, aren't you?" Sam gets distracted by Dean's nervous swallow, the quick flicker of tongue to wet his lips, and almost misses the meaning when his brother presses on, stubborn and oblivious, with, "And if this is what you need? You can have it, man, it's yours."

" _Jesus_ , Dean," Sam breathes when the enormity of the words hits him. "I don't want it like that."

"Like what?"

"Like… like _that_. Like you offering yourself up because you think it'll help fix anything. It _won't_ , and I'm not using you like that."

"Really." Dean's eyebrow is as skeptical as his voice, and he gives it all of a heartbeat before yanking Sam down against him, an open welcome of a kiss that drags Sam in and spins itself brutal in seconds.

Willpower is miles beyond him, and somehow Sam still manages to draw free from the perfect heat of Dean's mouth to glower down at him. Dean quirks that eyebrow again, blatant challenge, and doesn't bother with subtle as he gropes Sam through his jeans. Sam growls and pins Dean's wrists against the car, out of trouble's way.

"God _damnit_ , Dean. I hurt you before!"

"Maybe. And?"

"And I'm not doing it again."

"No shit, dude. That wasn't _you_." Sam is about to protest, really he is, but Dean steamrolls right through his attempt. "I know you were out of your head, man. I _know_ that, and I'd still do it again in a heartbeat, and I'm sorry. But Sam, please, if you need this--"

"Stop _saying_ that!" Sam feels frustration bubble desperate in his veins, and the midnight breeze isn't enough to cool this fever. "Enough with the martyr complex, okay? We both know you don't want this."

"You really so sure of that?"

And the thing is, Sam _isn't_ sure. Dean's eyes are still ablaze, dramatic emotions clashing like fuel and fire, but there's more to it now. The guilt, the terror, all still shine persistent in that look, but there's _more_. Something hot sparking behind everything else, and it adds to the inferno already at work undermining Sam's fading restraint.

"If I fall," he whispers suddenly, leaning in close and breathing against Dean's ear. "Will you still be there?"

"Yeah, Sammy," says Dean, no hesitation.

When Sam goes down, he's going to take Dean with him. The revelation isn't new. It aches with familiarity and still stabs at him like failure. But maybe if he can keep Dean close enough, it won't come to that. Maybe his beautiful, stubborn brother can hold him steady and keep him from going down at all. Maybe if Sam can fend off hell's claim on Dean's soul, they'll finally have enough hope to go around.

"I _am_ gonna save you," Sam says, drawing back. He lets command, power, and a little bit of the darkness drip into his voice, more honest than he's let Dean see in months. "So stop fighting me all the time. Okay?"

He can see the struggle, the urge to argue, the rebuttal nearly reaching his brother's lips. He watches Dean reluctantly swallow it whole, and he shakes with relief when Dean opens his mouth and says, "Okay."

It's the last line left to cross, trampled a dozen times over, and Sam knows that there's _nothing_ he won't do now. He's got nothing but this to hold sacred. Dean knows it, too, shivers against him and brandishes his surest game face. Sam's destiny feels closer, darker, thicker on the wind. Desperate with whatever this is settling between them. But his brother will be with him to the end, no matter where it takes them.

When Dean twists free and kisses him again, slips a hand down to the zipper of his jeans, Sam finally, willingly lets go.

~*~*~*fin*~*~*~


End file.
